This is the autobiography of a working-class boy who became an Oxford professor. A.H. Halsey was born in Kentish Town, London, in 1923 - a railway child in a large clan. The family moved in 1926 to Rutland and then to Northamptonshire because the father had been wounded in the Great War. Halsey 'won the scholarship' to Kettering Grammar School in 1933, left school at 16, went into the RAF as a pilot cadet. The metaphor of travel through time and space is maintained throughout this autobiography. The story begins with daily walks past canal boats in Oxford, flashes to the Pacific to Hong Kong and China, and then to a glimpse of death in the John Radcliffe Hospital, promising to explain the whole journey from a council housing estate to a professorial chair at Oxford.

When Balfour resigned in 1905, Edward VII invited Henry Campbell-Bannerman to form a new government. Despite winning a large majority in the subsequent general election, Campbell-Bannerman's Liberal Party were often thwarted by the Conservative-led House of Lords. This biography examines Campbell-Bannerman's career.

William Cavendish, the father of the first Earl, dissolved monasteries for Henry VIII. Bess, his second wife, was gaoler-companion to Mary Queen of Scots during her long imprisonment in England. Arbella Stuart, their granddaughter, was a heartbeat away from the throne of England and their grandson, the Lord General of the North, fought to save the crown for Charles I. With the help of previously unpublished material from the Chatsworth archives, The Devonshires reveals how the dynasty made and lost fortunes, fought and fornicated, built great houses, patronised the arts and pioneered the railways, made great scientific discoveries, and, in the end, came to terms with changing times.

A Welshman among the English, a nonconformist among Anglicans and a self-made man in the patrician corridors of power, David Lloyd George, the last Liberal Prime Minister of Great Britain, was the founding father of the Welfare State and was as great a peacetime leader as Churchill was in war. In this fascinating biography of an authentic radical, Roy Hattersley charts the great reforms - the first old age pension, sick pay and unemployment benefit - of which Lloyd George was architect, and also sheds light on the complexities of a man who was both a tireless champion of the poor, and a restless philanderer who was addicted to living dangerously.

Edwardian Britain is the quintessential age of nostalgia, often seen as the last long summer afternoon before the cataclysmic changes of the twentieth century began to take form. The class system remained rigidly in place and thousands were employed in domestic service. The habits and sports of the aristocracy were an everyday indulgence. But it was an age of invention as well as tradition. It saw the first widespread use of the motor car, the first aeroplane and the first use of the telegraph. It was also a time of vastly improved education and the public appetite for authors such as Conan Doyle, Rudyard Kipling and E. M. Forster was increased by greater literacy. There were signs too, of the corner history was soon to turn, with the problematic Boer War hinting at a new British weakness overseas and the drive for Votes for Women and Home Rule for Ireland pushing the boundaries of the social and political landscape. In this major work of history, Roy Hattersley has been given exclusive access to many new documents to produce this magisterial new appraisal of a legendary age.

John Wesley led the Second English Reformation. His Methodist 'Connexion' was divided from the Church of England, not by dogma and doctrine but by the new relationship which it created between clergy and people. Throughout a life tortured by doubt about true faith and tormented by a series of bizarre relationships with women, Wesley kept his promise to 'live and die an ordained priest of the Established Church'. However by the end of the long pilgrimage - from the Oxford Holy Club through colonial Georgia to every market place in England - he knew that separation was inevitable. But he could not have realised that his influence on the new industrial working class would play a major part in shaping society during the century of Britain's greatest power and influence and that Methodism would become a worldwide religion and the inspiration of 20th century television evangelism.

In 2010, the Labour Party of Great Britain suffered its worst General Election defeat since the 1930s (with one exception), bringing to an end thirteen years of New Labour government. Since then, the debate over both the legacy of New Labour and the future direction of the party has been widespread, yet so far there has been little consideration from a social democratic perspective. The chapters in this book cover a wide range of issues and provide new perspectives in the areas of economic, social and foreign policy with a central focus on the defence of the state. The chapters on the economy put forward a strategy for economic growth through industrial democracy and collective ownership, whilst in terms of social policy a more radical agenda than New Labour's is advocated, underpinned by stronger notions of social justice, equality and welfare rights. In the context of growing nationalist sentiments and calls for Scottish independence, this book sets out the importance of central state activity, the promotion of a public service ethos and civil liberties and a social democratic approach to the increasingly important issue of national identity. Finally, it sets out an alternative agenda on foreign and defence policy including the promotion of international development and human rights and a reformed Europe. Containing high-profile contributions from journalists, academics, policy-makers and think tanks, The Socialist Way provides new directions for electoral success and argues that there is not a trade-off between power and principle.

Roy Hattersley's dog Buster stepped into the limelight in April 1996 after an incident with a goose in St James's Park a goose which happened to belong to the Queen. Pursued by the press ever since, he has sought solace in writing. Here he details the absurdities of his life with The Man, who clearly wants to be a dog but lacks the necessary qualities. The blood of the tundra wolves roars through Buster's veins and demands that he hold strong views on the role and status of the fin-de-siecle dog. Buster's book exposes the truth about man-made fallacies such as diet, discipline and exercise, and also extols the joys of human-ownership.

The story of Catholicism in Britain from the Reformation to the present day, from a master of popular history - 'A first-class storyteller' The Times Throughout the three hundred years that followed the Act of Supremacy - which, by making Henry VIII head of the Church, confirmed in law the breach with Rome - English Catholics were prosecuted, persecuted and penalised for the public expression of their faith. Even after the passing of the emancipation acts Catholics were still the victims of institutionalised discrimination. The first book to tell the story of the Catholics in Britain in a single volume, The Catholics includes much previously unpublished information. It focuses on the lives, and sometimes deaths, of individual Catholics - martyrs and apostates, priests and laymen, converts and recusants. It tells the story of the men and women who faced the dangers and difficulties of being what their enemies still call 'Papists'. It describes the laws which circumscribed their lives, the political tensions which influenced their position within an essentially Anglican nation and the changes in dogma and liturgy by which Rome increasingly alienated their Protestant neighbours - and sometime even tested the loyalty of faithful Catholics. The survival of Catholicism in Britain is the triumph of more than simple faith. It is the victory of moral and spiritual unbending certainty. Catholicism survives because it does not compromise. It is a characteristic that excites admiration in even a hardened atheist.

Called an uneasy peace, the twenty years between the wars were a time of turmoil - Britain saw a general strike and the worst economic crisis in its history, armed rebellion in Ireland and open revolt in India, a Prime Minister's resignation and the King's abdication. Crisis followed crisis until Britain was engulfed in the Second World War - a catastrophe that could have been foreseen, possibly even prevented. But there were also moments of triumph: England regained the Ashes and Britain ran to glory in the 'Chariots of Fire' Olympic Games; the BBC was born and became the envy of the free world; there was a renaissance in poetry, sculpture of genius, and cinema lightened the darkness for millions. However it is the politicians who failed who have really come to personify the interwar years - in particular Ramsey MacDonald and Stanley Baldwin. Both prime ministers were better men than history allows. And Winston Churchill? Right or wrong, success or failure, he is the irrepressible force in what he called the 'years for the locusts to eat'. Hattersley's assessment of this doomed era is illuminating, entertaining and bold.

Passionate, affectionate and indefatigably curious, In Search of England makes a journey around the English countryside and character. England is the most various of countries; within its borders, life changes mile on mile. Roy Hattersley celebrates crumbling churches and serene Victorian architecture, magnificent hills and wind-whipped coast, our music, theatre and local customs, and, above all, the quirky good humour and resilience of England's denizens. In Search of England is an unapologetic love story, a paean of praise for all the fascinating variety and flavour of England's places and people.